The River of Styx
by The Generally Insane One
Summary: A Major comes to the 4077th in shreads from a sneak attack, but they have more problems than most have noticed... please r and r cause I'll review you((im bad at summaries))


AN: Okay, this is a completely edited version. I posted the last one before it was ready, and I apoligize for it being so bad. Please don't be mad at me? Thanks for putting up with crap

Chapter One: Emotionally, physically, mentaly…

"Wake up everybody. Its one am… though I'm sure it's a sensible time of day elsewhere in the world, but we have wounded, not as many as usual, but enough to make life miserable!" The PA blared, waking the majority of the MASH 4077th. Captain 'Hawkeye' Pierce woke up from one of the nicest dreams that he had dreamt in a long time to be thrown back to his never-ending purgatory that was Korea. He groaned and sat up, slowly pulling himself awake for the grueling task that lay before him. As the door to the Swamp popped open and closed, he began to get ready faster. He and the only remaining occupant of the tent, B.J. Hunnicut glanced at each other and rolled their eyes. Both were thinking the same thing. Frank should not leave the two of them unsupervised around his stuff. For the first time in a while, Frank would have to thank the war for landing the casualties at the MASH before either surgeon could do anything. The ambulance came in rather quickly, and almost failed to stop. Either the driver was drunk, or there was someone on that bus that was really badly hurt. The pair of them left the Swamp quickly and made their way over to the ambulance. Pierce sighed to himself. There were at least twenty people on the ambulance, and none of them to be in any good shape at all. The ambulance driver jumped out quickly and immediately came over to Hawkeye.

"You a doctor?" he asked breathlessly.

"Yeah one of them, what do you want?" Hawkeye asked him back.

"I've got one who is hurt really bad. They have at least sixteen shots to the gut and a shattered left leg." The driver replied slightly jittery.

"Where?" Hawkeye felt his stomach go cold for a second. Normally it was shrapnel and a few bullets, but sixteen shots to the belly… It sounded like the squad was hit by an ambush…

"Right by the door," the driver said, dragging Pierce over to the ambulance, " They looked pretty bad earlier." He opened the door and jumped into the back with Pierce hot on his tail.

"That one sir…" he said, pointing to a soldier with light brown hair. Pierce frowned when he saw the pins on the person's jacket, a Majors leaf, and a sniper cross hair

"What's a sniper doing with wounds like this?" he asked the driver.

"Um, no idea sir," the driver looked around conspiritorialy, " Just do your best with this one doc please?"

" I do my best with every G.I. that comes through here Corpral. Now could you get out of the way so that I could do my work please?" Hawkeye asked, almost snapping.

"That's good doc… Um just one more thing…"

"What is it?"

"Uh… the Major… is um… well…"

"Corpral, he dosent have all night!"

"Well that's just it. He is a she." Pierce froze for a second before round ing on the Corpral.

"What?" he asked quietly.

"Just that sir… Um I have to go now…" the Corpral managed to slip off before Pierce could ask him any more questions.

"What?" he asked the night thouraghly confused. Slowly, he shook his head and walked back to the Major. He lifted the bandages on the Majors stomach and winced.

"Well Major, you officially pass for Swiss cheese." He said to himself, knowing that the Major was probably out from pain, or anaesthetic. " Why do you look like Swiss cheese?"

"Cause I wasn't watching my six." The Major replied, making Pierce jump a foot in the air.

"What the hell are you doing awake?" he asked in shock.

"Battalion aid ran out of sedative… I had to settle with morphine…" the Major replied, her voice weak with pain and blood loss. She gripped Pierces wrist tightly.

"You take the other snipers before me, you hear?" she hissed sharply. Pierce pulled her hand off of his wrist.

"And you hear me Major, you will be going first. You're nearly dead here. You can't wait." He said. The major glared at him viciously with her stunning gray eyes, before shuddering from pain and closing them. Before she could say anything else, Pierce went up through the rest of the bus, looking for, if there were more, any more snipers. He had to go right to the very back before finding them. His face fell as he saw the four other snipers had bled to death on their way over. He turned around sighing and found that most of the bus had been unloaded. He climbed out as two corpsmen came in to get out one of the four snipers.

"Take your time with those four corpsmen. They can't be saved." He ducked out of the truck into the fresh air, trying to get the Majors gray eyes out of his mind. He slowly walked over to BJ who was just looking at one of the last men in triage.

"Beej, can I talk to you for a second?" he asked, still slightly confused.

"Yeah sure Hawk, just a second," BJ said, " Get him in quickly, I'll see him first." He stood up and the two friends began to walk off to pre-op. " What is it Hawk?"

"I just got the weirdest patient ever, a sniper with at least half a clip in her stomach." Pierce said, waiting to see BJ's reaction. He stopped walking.

"Did you just say 'her'?" he asked.

"Yeah I did." Pierce said his eye brows furrowed in confusion. B.J. didn't say anything in responce. He just shook his head and began to walk away. Pierce heared him mutter; "Next they'll be sending over dogs with explosive collars", as they walked into pre-op to scrub.

Two Hours later

"Damn it, get me some adrenaline…" Pierce snapped for the second time that night. The Major's heart had stopped beating again.

"What's the matter Pierce, losing your so-called talent?" Frank Burns hissed.

"At least I have talent to lose unlike some people here!" Pierce snapped back as the nurse handed him the adrenaline. He quickly injected it into the Majors heart, which thankfully started beating.

"Now don't be much more spiteful Major, you keep your heart beating." He whispered and continued working on her stomach, once again shutting his mind off, to Franks grumbling or anything else that had nothing to do with the operation.

Pierce sighed and backed away from the operating table.

"Done…" he said quietly. He ripped off his gloves and threw them in the scrap bucket. Vaguely he realized that someone was looking over his shoulder.

"That's a good job you did Hawk," BJ said, "You seemed very focused for once. Most of Frank's whining didn't get to you."

"Yeah that was different." Pierce sighed slightly, " I can't belive that they still let the incompetant fool even near a scalpel." B.J. nodded.

"You did a good job." He said, quickley changing the subject.

"As always…" Pierce said looking around. No one else was left except BJ and himself. " Where is every one?"

"They all left. No one was that badly hurt, just a lot of broken bones and minor wounds." BJ said. Hawkeye scoffed at him.

"Nothing in war is minor…" her replied as two corpsmen took the major into post op. He stopped nurse Kellye and said to her:

"Look, keep an eye on her for a while… If anything goes wrong call me…" He began to stagger out of the operating room. BJ followed him to make sure he didn't hurt himself.

"Come on Hawk, I'll buy you a few drinks…" he said. Pierce nodded silently and grinned.

"What are you grinning at?" Bj asked.

"Nothing…" Pierce replied, shaking his head again.

It was dark. The roar of the darkness pounded in her ears. The darkness soothed the truth that she knew was all too real. Then again, she could be just as dea-

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No Kawalski, you aren't dead…

Yeah just keep thinking that, you overly optimistic dolt…

She tried to wrench her eyes open and found them unwilling to respond to her will. She tried again, forcing all of her strength into opening her eyes. Slowly, they began to crack open. The setting that met her tired eyes was another darkness, yet it had some sort of pale light swimming through it vaguely. She blinked slightly, and stared at the ceiling. Slowly, she waded through her muddy memories. Nothing seemed to be coming to mind at all. Then suddenly, everything snapped back in reverse. The truck, battalion aid, the shots, the blood, the pain, the… the death. She gasped loudly. Tears sprung into her eyes.

__

No that had to have been a dream. It had to have been a nasty evil nightmare caused by too much pressure. I should have never joined the army… Too much pressure…

Her hands flew to her stomach to see if the 'wounds' were real, though surly they shouldn't be. They wouldn't be. She went numb as her fingers touched the soft gauze encircling her belly.

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No… Not now… not ever…

She curled her fists in anger at herself as her stomach throbbed. She vaguely noticed that her left leg was slightly numb, not that it really mattered. What mattered was that everyone she knew was dead. She let out a quiet sob, which caused someone to jump nearby. Quiet foot-steps came and shattered the silence of her own purgatory. She kept her eyes on the ceiling in disbelief. She could hear someone talking, but refused to listen to what they were saying. She just stared at the ceiling even when someone came up and flashed a small light in her eyes. That somehow managed to get her attention. She clued in to what they were saying.

"… look Major if you don't want to talk to me that is fine. Just give me some form of recognition that you're alive!" a man said exasperatedly.

"Go away." she replied, her voice cracking annoyingly. Why on earth did she sound so damned weak? She clenched her fists tightly so that they became pale ghosts.

"Fine, I'll just go." The man said indignantly. " And that's the thanks we get from people like you." He muttered for a good ten minutes before she shut him out. Then exhaustion and pain did its job, sending her into the unkindest sleep she had ever known.

She felt cold again.

__

Maybe this is what pain really feels like, a cold place of hell.

It was morning, but not in her heart or mind. She felt even more lost and hurt more than she did the previous night. It hurt more than any physical wound she had ever suffered_._

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Emotional pain, the nastiest thing anyone could suffer.

She blinked weakly, and shifted her head slightly to get a better look around. The room wasn't anything special, just like and MASH really.

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Full of death and army regulation blood spattered khaki.

Long rows of cots, only half full with wounded. Most of them only had bandages on their arms or legs. Some of them even seemed happy.

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You would be too if you got away from the carnage out there. With the others of course!

Yes but they were dead.

__

Good god woman, get control of yourself!

"Good morning Kawalski, how are you today?" some one asked. She recognized the voice vaguely. It wasn't the one she had told to go away. It was…

The one on the bus.

"It's not so good for some of us." she hissed darkly. Her voice still sounded cracked and harsh. Maybe it had something to do with being injured.

"Oh come on, you're just being pessimistic now." the doctor said, loosing some of the happiness in his voice.

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No I'm not.

She turned her head and glared at him.

"If I am, I do belive that I have a right to." She grumbled.

"Now that's just pessimistic." The doctor sat down on the end of her bed. Her eyes hardened even more in a glare.

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Go away

"Leave me alone." she said weakly. It sounded more like a beg. " Please…"

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Oh yeah like that's going to make him leave!

"No I don't think that I'm going to leave," he said. He was infuriating her.

"You couldn't stop them from leaving could you?" she snapped harshley. She could almost scence him become crestfallen.

"They had already left." He said standing up. She shot upwards as he began to walk away, causing herself extreme discomfort in her stomach region.

"What do you mean?" she asked between the gasps of pain. He stopped and turned back again.

"I couldn't stop them because they were already dead. They had been dead for ten minutes…" he said. He saw the pain in her face and felt hurt that he couldn't help her. She could see it.

__

I don't want your sympathy…

"Oh…" she said weakly. " I'm sorry for snapping at you… You obviously can't bring people back from the dead…" She forced the words out knowing that they didn't really make a difference to how she was feeling. He nodded as if in acknowlagement.

"Okay," he said," you should try sleeping some more. It may help you… feel better…"

__

Physically, emotionally, or mentally? You jerk!

She nodded and closed her eyes, lying back down again. The sunlight just hit her face, making her feel colder than before.

__

I am now stone…

A/N: Okay, im sorry that this was really bad and that it still kind of is, but I do promise that the next one will be better. Plus Kawalski wont be as mary-sue-ish… though in some peoples minds she always will be… grins okay, well thanks for reading. And don't forget to review… I accept flames, cause although they are harsh, they can still be constructive.


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